LaSalle: The calm before Tuesday's storm

Next Tuesday, a new president of the United States will be chosen by the voting citizens of this country, some defective voting machines and a handful of deceased folks from Chicago.

Until then, we can savor the calm before the storm — coincidentally caused by an actual storm — and look back on this circus of an election.

It all began with what now seems like a distant memory: the Republican primary. The primary debates looked like the lineup for a remake of “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World,” all of the misfits racing for the nomination.

There was eventual nominee Mitt Romney’s challenge to Rick Perry, issued in the form of a $10,000 bet, ensuring that Romney looked as out-of-touch as Scrooge McDuck, swimming in his gold-filled vault. There was Michele Bachmann’s claim that Mrs. Woman-at-a-Rally told her an HPV vaccine gave her daughter mental retardation.

There was Rick Santorum’s permanent facial expression of perpetual digestive discomfort. There was Rick Perry’s Texas-sized “Oops” moment, when he struggled to name the third department of the federal government he would eliminate. I’m not sure if a campaign has ever crashed and burned so quickly in one moment.

There was overconfidence from Georgia’s own Newt Gingrich, who said “I’m going to be the nominee. It’s very hard not to look at the recent polls and think that the odds are very high I’m going to be the nominee.” How did that work out, Newt?

Then there was Pizza-man Herman Cain, his “999” plan, his obligatory sex scandal and what turned out to be another crash-and-burn moment: the “Libya” question. When asked why he opposed President Obama’s strategy in Libya, Cain drew a blank, looking more confused than a Palm Beach, Fla., voter.

Eventually, we made our way into the general election, and President Obama had plenty of catching up to do. No challenge was too great for the president, whose first debate performance was legendarily sedated. He looked like a 6-year-old in the outfield at a little-league baseball game, preferring to sit around a pick at the grass instead of pay attention to what was happening around him.

Even Obama himself conceded his underwhelming performance, acknowledging it by saying, “I had a bad night,” which is like saying “Poland was inconvenienced during WWII.”

On second thought, the Poland/WWII comparison is probably better suited to moderator Jim Lehrer, who may or may not have been clinically deceased throughout the debate.

Of course, we can’t forget the vice presidential debate between Paul Ryan and Joe Biden’s creepy grin. Actually, I think I would rather forget it. That smile is the stuff of nightmares.

That was followed by the second presidential debate, featuring a much more awake Obama. In fact, this Obama was more akin to an awakened bear, ready to fight. The town hall-style debate had Romney and Obama ignoring most politically correct “manners” in favor of simply calling their opponent out, repeating “That’s not true,” “That’s wrong,” and “Shut up, moderator.”

Of course, we also have aspects of the electoral circus that are as disheartening as they absurd. This was the first post-Citizens United v. Federal Election Commision election. The Citizens United case saw the Supreme Court hold that the First Amendment prohibited the government from restricting political expenditures by corporations and unions. Basically, that means corporations are people and your vote is being outweighed by someone else’s wallet.

Even that is aside from how politics seems to bring out the worst in people. Both sides have been yelling about how their opponent is the absolute worst candidate/president in history, and that America is going to simply burst into flame unless you elect the right candidate.

Once the circus has passed — until campaigning for 2016 begins in 2013 — we can all take a deep breath and recognize that, now matter how absurd our election cycle can be, America still manages to come out on top.

Alex LaSalle is an editorial department intern at the Savannah Morning News and a Georgia Southern University student. alex.lasalle@savannahnow.com.